The hills of Manipur may appear beautiful, but behind the blossoms lie hunger, fear, and loss. Many farmers live in extreme poverty. Communities are breaking up under pressure. It is not just another drug issue. What it really is, is a huge human tragedy where desperation has replaced dignity, and placed a burden on every single person in Manipur. The response must begin with empathy, and a clear understanding of the people behind the thousands and thousands of acres of illegal opium poppy fields.
Most farmers do not plant illegal opium poppies by choice. They are threatened and intimidated, and their choices are not really choices at all, but a trap of bondage through fear and violence. Poppy cultivation in Manipur happens under the shadow of fear so pervasive that people have accepted as ‘normal' the existence of drug lords and armed traffickers in their society.
How Trap Is Set
The trap is set for the farmers when they are in desperate need of money for medical emergencies, children's education, or basic survival. Once they accept the advance payment for illegal opium poppy cultivation, the money turns into chains that coil around their feet like a snake. Trouble and violence will pay their families a visit if the farmers do not deliver the harvest as agreed while accepting the advance payment. This is how families in Manipur become indebted to the very forces that are exploiting them. They are hostages to a mix of economic pressure and threat of violence which can last for many years of crop cycles.
The pattern of fear, economic control, and violence converging on remote farming communities proves Manipur's issue is not about crime and punishment, but a systematic exploitation of vulnerable people. Addressing it needs more than law enforcement; it needs moral courage and collective action.
Communities Corrode
The harm from illegal opium poppy cultivation extends beyond farmers. Poppy farming erodes community ties and destroys traditional farming knowledge built over generations. Young people, seeing the apparent profitability of opium, lose interest in education and legitimate livelihoods. Why study when quick money seems to grow in fields?
The most tragic part of all this is how poppy-growing regions have themselves become consumers of their own ‘product'. Farmers growing illegal opium poppies often receive payment partly in raw opium. What begins as occasional use spirals into dependency with merciless efficiency – young men who should be the backbone of agriculture get addicted; they don't want to work, and families disintegrate under the compounding strains of poverty, addiction, and shame. Communities lose their most productive members to the twin scourges of substance abuse and captivity. It is not just an economic crisis, but a spiritual and social death affecting entire generations.
Raids or crop destruction drives alone cannot solve Manipur's poppy crisis. While such actions are welcome, they only meet political and administrative expectations, but ignore the deeper causes that force farmers to grow poppies in the first place.
Destroying an illegal opium poppy field does nothing to the criminal groups who could force its replanting at the same site or somewhere else in the remote hills.
Lazarus Moment
The story of Lazarus mirrors Manipur's struggle. Lazarus had been dead for four days when Jesus arrived, his tomb sealed by a heavy stone. The situation seemed beyond hope, with death appearing final. Then Jesus called out, "Lazarus, come out."
But here's the crucial detail we often overlook – Jesus doesn't move the stone Himself. He commanded the community gathered there to roll the stone away, "Take away the stone," He told them.
The miracle of resurrection needed communion. The people had to believe enough to act, to remove the barrier physically, to participate in the impossible becoming possible. And even after Lazarus emerged from the tomb, still wrapped in a burial cloth, Jesus issued another command, “Take off the grave clothes and let him go." The community had to complete the work of liberation themselves.
Manipur's illegal poppy-growing communities are like Lazarus in that tomb, bound by the forces of intimidation, economic pressure, and fear. The stone of oppression has been rolled over them by those who profit from their captivity. Many have been in this tomb for so long that hope itself seems dead. But resurrection is possible only if the community comes together to roll away the stone.
It means the community must physically act to protect their own. When villages unite, fear loses power. Collective strength makes intimidation harder and restores moral order, turning resistance into pride and poppy farming into shame.
Choosing Life
We can mobilise communities to create protective networks where farmers can safely refuse poppy cultivation. We must roll away the stone of fear, unbind those who are trapped in cycles of debt and intimidation, and support each other in choosing life over the living death of the opium economy.
Ending illegal poppy farming will foster peace, stability, and honest work. It will free farmers from addiction, and let Manipur's communities, forests, and traditions thrive again. This vision is not utopian – it is entirely achievable if we commit ourselves to it collectively.
But achieving this vision requires action at every level. The government must create real economic alternatives, enforce the law with fairness, and protect those who stand against the drug trade. The civil society must build awareness, support vulnerable communities, and push for solutions to the causes, not just the effects. Religious and community leaders must use their influence to delegitimize drug cultivation and consumption.
Most importantly, we must show compassion to those caught in this system while maintaining firm opposition to the system itself. Farmers growing illegal opium poppies under intimidation need a way out; they need the community to roll away the stone and unbind them. Communities must support one another to ensure young people at risk of addiction get proper education and opportunity.
Turning away from this crisis by dismissing it as someone else's problem or purely a matter of law enforcement shows moral failure. The people of Manipur deserve much better than having their state synonymous with drug production. Farmers deserve to work their land free from fear that shapes their every choice. Manipur stands on the crossroad of life or death. If the current path continues, communities will fall deeper into addiction, violence, and environmental ruin. Communities must instead choose to break oppressive chains. With collective action, genuine alternatives, and courage, Manipur can reclaim its future.
The road ahead will be hard because those who profit from drug trafficking will resist. Real change demands persistence, support, and above all, a renewal of community spirit strong enough to face intimidation.
This is our Lazarus moment. The time to act is now.
(Chongboi Haokip is an MCIHort specialising in agriculture, horticulture, and trade facilitation in Britain)
